Chief Richard Boyes of the Sarnia, Ontario, Fire Department has served as chair of the International Association of Fire Chiefs' Transportation Emergency Rescue Committee for the past two years and has been involved with the group since its inception in 1984. TERC's mission is to serve as a source of guidance and information on transportation emergencies for those involved in providing emergency services. There are currently 23 members on the committee from all over the world bringing expertise in vehicle, bus, trucking, shipping, rail and aircraft emergencies. The group hosts regional and international extrication competitions where some of the best extrication teams in the world demonstrate their skills. Fire Chief recently spoke with Boyes to get an update on the group's activities.

FC: What's new with TERC?

Boyes: In the next year you're going to see us start to launch more specialized seminars [and] conferences on rescue to reach out and get more firefighters, because now it's a very limited number that compete and can make it to the competition. The IAFC has mandated [that we] go out there and do larger educational formats, get information out to the chief officers about what's going on in the field of vehicle rescue, what the chiefs need to deal with, what the issues of the day are, and have the chiefs flow it down to the firefighters. So you will see the TERC committee really starting to fulfill its education mandate by being more visible. Our ultimate goal is to be known as the first word or last word in vehicle rescue, and that's what the IAFC wants us to do.

FC: How will the seminars be organized?

Boyes: They're going to become stand-alone events; sometimes they'll be together with a competition, sometimes they won't. Ultimately, we'd like to get to a two- or three-day, national or international symposium where we can bring the experts together in vehicle rescue along with vehicle manufacturers and do a symposium that will reach a vast number of rescuers whether they're chief officers, training officers or firefighters. [They] can see what the needs are and learn about vehicle rescue from the experts, and then we can get that information back to the street where we need the people.

FC: What would you say are the major advances in extrication technology?

Boyes: I think the major advances are some of the small tools that have come out. The tool manufacturers have always had the big spreaders and the big cutters — what they've done is they've developed combination tools, small tools, hand tools that work in the different areas and more confined space. Some of the tools have now been broadened out to become multi-function tools that were maybe started as extrication tools, but have now gone into US&R applications and things like that. In 1984 the heavy hydraulics were very, very new, the tools were very primitive — they were more like auto body tools that people used and over the years. It's become a really specialized industry with many new types of tools that have come out to make the job easier.

Vehicle rescue used to be done literally by a tow-truck operator who would pull the door off a car and a rotary saw with an abrasive wheel that would cut with all the sparks, and now we've gotten down to air-operated tools and hydraulic tools that make it safe for the rescuer and the patient. A lot of fire departments during the late '70s and early '80s weren't even involved in extrication, and it's now evolved into a probably the second most-run call that departments do. Like a lot of fire departments, everybody is doing a lot of medical responses, but vehicle rescues are probably either number two or number three in the fire department run list.

FC: If departments are interested, how do they get information about TERC and its activities?

Boyes: Go to the TERC Web site, <www.terc.org>, or the IAFC Web site, <www.iafc.org>.

The other thing that's happened that's really exciting is in 1999 there was a subcommittee created called TERC Canada and that subcommittee is looking after all of extrication in Canada from competitions to coordinating learning symposiums. Just this year in Minnesota at the international competition, we got TERC USA off the ground, so we have the two subcommittees under the TERC committee looking after the regional competitions. Both subcommittees are going to run a national competition in 2004, but they're also going to take an active role in promoting the educational component to get that message out to the firefighters. Both of those subcommittees are available on the TERC Web site [along with] the contact people. What we're trying to do is create a large network on a regional zone where a fire chief or a training officer or a firefighter can go find their local experts within their city, county, state or province and get their information and then become a better rescuer.